Antonym of 'to request'

I would like to have an antonym of to request. A computer process requests a resource and when the resource is assigned to the process, the process does not request the resource anymore, since it is assigned. So I need a word to express this undo mechanism. Any ideas?

When it comes to computer processes, there are several possibilities:

• request a resource

  This would be the system "allocating" a resource. The opposite would be to request deallocation. The opposite, from the perspective of the system would be to deallocate

• request a lock

  This is similar to requesting a resource, but has it's own terminology. This is "requesting a lock" whereas it's reversal would be canceling the request (if it's not been fulfilled yet) or releasing the lock if the process already has the lock.

• request data

  This would be a process requesting data from another process or the system. This would be "requesting a response". The opposite would be cancelling the request, or receiving the request, or (from the perspective of the requestee) responding to the request, or simply responding

• requesting an event

  This would be a process requesting another process to do something. This would be "requesting an event" or "requesting a service". The opposite would be canceling the request, or requesting the cancellation of the event, possibly even requesting a cancellation event. From the perspective of the requestee, it would be a cancellation event or maybe a cancel request. The result might be a cancel response (for disjointed processes).

Ultimately, it really depends on the situation and the type of request being made. It also depends on the stage of the process that the request is in. (e.g. Was the request just made? Is the request made and accepted? Was the request processed?) This, unfortunately, requires much more information than you have provided.

It's simply

cancel the request

Very straightforward. You can see any number of examples of this by googling something like "apple documentation cancel the request".

I dug up an almost exact example of what you mean:

Don't forget to cancel your Bonjour resolve!

Q: After I Resolve a Bonjour service in order to get its IP addresses, do I need to cancel the Resolve operation?

A: Yes! Leaving the Resolve operation running places an unnecessary burden on the network because you end up sending query packets.... You should only Resolve the service at the moment you need to connect to it, and you should cancel the Resolve immediately after successfully connecting to the service. ... The process by which you cancel the Resolve operation(s) depends on the method you are using ....

For what it's worth, if anyone needs any more examples, you can see zillions of examples of the usage on this page (this happens to be the main internet-access library used on iPhones).

There are several antonyms depending on the context.

Antonym of the v. to request

• to retract, to revoke: request|retract the question
• to provide, to give: request|provide the money
• to cancel the request

In your particular case of "does not request it anymore, since it received the resource already" there might be a problem. Are you trying to describe the state, or the action? If it is really the action do you need an action opposite of the actual request or an action that will cancel the effects of a request (reverse the acquisition of resources)?

The following paragraph tries to put to use some of the suggestions, so multiple meanings are intended:

I assume that you do not want to retract, revoke or cancel your question or request, but if a useful answer to your request was provided or given you might be: satisfied or fulfilled. In another words you might be holding the resource you requested.

In case you actually need a verb that describes what happens next you might consider to release (the resources held).

Even in regards to computer resources, it depends on context.

Local system resources (port addresses, memory allocation etc) would be handled pretty much instantaneously. Therefore the concept of 'cancelling a request' is meaningless... the REQUEST has been fulfilled (ie: it is no longer a request) and the resource allocated. If you no longer need the resource and wish to return it's control to the system you took it from, you simply RELEASE the resource.

In a remote system (ie: request a web-page from a server), you send a request to cancel delivery of the content. Strictly speaking, a web page is in fact more then one request. Each element (picture, java applet, text, etc) is a request in its own right. Therefore, on receiving a cancellation request, the server will simply ignore any further requests. They will be DELETED FROM THE REQUEST QUEUE, FLUSHED or DROPPED.

There is a caveat though. Elements already in transit will continue to be sent until completed. Most browsers however, will immediately respond to a user cancelling a page by simply not rendering these items. They will simply DROP or IGNORE them.

In short, locally you would RELEASE a request, an upload request will be FLUSHED from the request queue, a download would be IGNORED but still complete. There are some exceptions with some server software and download managers, but even then, consider torrent software where it still completes downloading of currently active blocks after you stop the download. Each block being a separate request.